Dog's life on Death Row (pity about the people)

To Bonnie and Clyde and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, add Jessie and Chase.

Folk heroes in their native state of Oregon, Jesse and Chase are languishing on Death Row. Unusually, for the American public rarely gets agitated about the fate of condemned criminals, the people of Oregon are howling for their release. And such has been the clamour that state politicians, mostly enthusiastic proponents of capital punishment, plan to change the law.

These are the facts of the case. Jessie - elegant, blonde, seven years old - and Chase - stocky, cropped, seven months - were playing in their garden on 5 January when a stray dog jumped over the fence. All three then disappeared through a gate.

Owner Lynn Stone searched high and low, but to no avail. The next day she was told that Jessie, a golden retriever, and Chase, a beagle, had been impounded after a farmer complained they had been chasing his pregnant ewes.

At a hearing next morning a board of five county supervisors sentenced them to die. The law in Oregon is quite clear: it is a capital offence for dogs to chase, never mind attack, livestock.

The execution was to be carried out with immediate effect - whereupon Mrs Stone broke down crying and the board gave her a day to seek legal help.

Her lawyer persuaded a judge to sign a stay of execution, which alerted the media: the Oregonian ran front page photos of the hapless creatures and other papers and TV followed suit. The letters, phone calls and faxes poured into the office of the governor and the Oregon state legislature.

So, by popular demand, Senator Neil Bryant is drafting a bill that would allow sheep-chasing dogs to escape execution in extenuating circumstances.

The public lodged twice as many pleas for mercy, the governor's office said, as they did last September when the state carried out its first execution of a human in 24 years. As for the 20 remaining humans on Death Row, the silence has been deafening.